The Leeward Planning Commission signed off last week on a Kohala resident’s plan to open a home business. The Leeward Planning Commission signed off last week on a Kohala resident’s plan to open a home business. ADVERTISING Rebecca Jacobs filed
The Leeward Planning Commission signed off last week on a Kohala resident’s plan to open a home business.
Rebecca Jacobs filed the special permit request with the Planning Department, seeking permission to open an acupuncture clinic in her Hookela Place garage. Jacobs’ property is on agricultural zoned land.
The Planning Department recommended the commission approve the request.
“The proposal is an unusual and reasonable use of land situated within the State Land Use Agricultural District,” the recommendation letter said.
Not all agriculturally zoned land is appropriate for growing crops, the recommendation noted.
Jacobs, in her application, said she would limit patient hours to 10 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. three days a week, with a maximum of 15 patients per week.
“An acupuncture clinic will complement existing health care choices and provide quality, full service health care and a convenient location for Kohala residents and visitors,” she wrote.
Commissioners also took action on two items for the same West Hawaii property. They revoked a special permit from 1992, issued to the Christian Science Society of Kailua-Kona, for a church and Sunday school on the 2-acre parcel north of Kuakini Highway and 300 feet southeast of the highway’s intersection with Keakealani Place.
Mamalahoa Development Corp. owns the land. Officials with the company requested the revocation, noting the parcel was now leased to a different tenant, Cingular Wireless, doing business as AT&T Mobility.
That tenant requested a use permit to build a cellular tower on the property. Cingular Wireless’ initial application called for an 84-foot steel monopole. They revised the request, asking instead to build an 88-foot steel monopine, a tower designed to look like a pine tree. The pole will have 12 eight-foot panel antennas and will take up 900 square feet of the parcel, which is just shy of 2 acres, the application said.
The new tower will serve customers in Kailua-Kona and Keauhou, the application said.
Commissioners revoked the old special use permit and approved the permit request for the cell tower.
